


Long Hard Road

by Vimes



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: F/M, Road Trips, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-08-27
Packaged: 2020-09-28 00:23:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20416805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vimes/pseuds/Vimes
Summary: One day during a particularly slow and boring winter, a handsome stranger with an obviously fake name wanders into the little inn you work at. Trouble predictably catches up to him and you jump at the chance for an adventure. For eyes meeting across the campfire, for having to huddle together for warmth, maybe even for stealing some rushed moments in a hayloft somewhere, if your good luck carries.Vimes/You, slow burn, AU where Vimes isn't married. Will definitely become Explicit down the line.





	Long Hard Road

The stranger arrived at the inn just after the beginning of the new year. On that day, all rooms but one was empty and the landlady installed him in what she liked to call the Suite, reasoning that even though, as fake names went, mr Stone wasn’t much more convincing than “John Smith” , his bearing and his armour and his paying the whole week in advance meant he was as good as a gentleman, but a little less likely to complain about the food. His appearance at the house caused a lot of comment because it was about as interesting as things got around this time of the year. Conrad, the all-around man who did every job that didn’t involve the guests directly, was all too eager to fill you in on what you’d missed when you came into the kitchen out of the cold.

“He’s a noble in disguise, I swear it.”

Sofie shook her head. “Not a chance. Too rough.”

“Nobles can be rough.”

“Not in that way. Military, maybe. An old warrior, living out his retirement.”

“I still think he’s hiding from something.”

Nobody had asked for your opinion, and since you didn’t ask anything yourself, the conversation carried on without you. Every little movement, no matter how small, seemed to fascinate your coworkers and the importance of this mysterious stranger was probably blown completely out of proportion for the sake of something to catch the imagination.

You saw him for the first time when he came down to dinner that evening. Service was informal when there were so few guests and the staff ate at the benches in the main hall instead of cooped up in the kitchen. As you poured water and wine he walked down the stairs and you watched him, eagle eyed, evaluating him.

Perhaps there was a reason for the fuss, after all. For one thing, his presence took up so much space and he didn’t seem to know it. He wore good clothes, but they weren’t sewn to fit him. His gait was an easy, unconscious swagger but there was a tension across the shoulders and he pulled at his shirt collar as if the fabric was foreign and uncomfortable.

Oh, and he was handsome. His whole form was chiseled in that skeletal way of those older men - you’d put him at around mid fifties, perhaps late forties if he’d lived as rough as he looked - lucky enough to become gaunt instead of puffy and ruddy with age. His hair must have been a dark brown or black before the iron grey crept in, his nose had stayed strong even after what looked to have been a thousand beatings and thick, roguish scars broke the prominent lines of his cheekbones and jaw.

His eyes were dark, sharp and clear and scanned the room methodically as he entered it, pausing a beat on the other doors opening into the hall and on each person occupying it. Finally they came to a rest on you, the only person there he hadn’t weighed up before tonight. As soon as he saw you looking back at him, he broke eye contact, nodded to your colleagues and walked to the darkest corner he could have found with - ah, yes. An unbroken line of sight of all three exits. This was a man on the run, or at least a man with a past of running.

Well, someone like that couldn’t be left to his own devices, so you took a pitcher in each hand and walked over to his table. He was from the plains, apparently, so Morporkian would have to do.

“Good evening, Sir. Can I get you anything to eat or drink?”

You could have sworn his left hand had graced his hip before it came to rest on the table. And what a hand it was, wide, rough, all thick veins and well worn knuckles. Well, it had been a long, dull winter, after all, and no harm in looking...

Was that a slight tremor to his fingers? Perhaps it would be better to ask him for the money up front and not risk a never-ending bar tab.

“Pardon?” Mr Stone looked up at you, distracted. You gestured to your apron, and he cleared his throat. “Oh. Supper’d be nice.”

You smiled and held his gaze. “And to drink?

“Water, thank you,” he replied with pointed emphasis and met your eyes just long enough to make sure this landed. His voice was firm and rough with an even rougher accent. Lovely. “Just water.”

“Just water,” you agreed and filled the cup in front of him. “Supper tonight is game stew, with a baked apple after if you want dessert.”

“Sure, why not.” Mr Stone was starting to look very uncomfortable indeed with being the focus of all this customer service and in the interest of finding out why, you winked and said “we could all use some sweetness now and again, wouldn't you say?”

If only he’d been a bit quicker with lifting the cup to his lips you were sure you would have had a fountain on your hands. As it was, he froze, frowned and looked around the room in a panic, searching for an escape or maybe someone besides you having a laugh at his expense. Before he had a chance to say anything, you turned on your heel and went to fetch him his dinner. It was a promising start, if nothing else.

That dinner seemed to have been mr Stone’s first meal of the day.

He kept very regular hours, they just weren’t regular to anyone else; he got up at around the same time in the late afternoon every day and he took a very late breakfast before going to bed. Even in bad weather and without clothes suited to the country, Stone insisted on taking daily walks and when he returned he was always frozen stiff and short tempered. Once, you heard him mutter under his breath that there was just “no goddamn reason” there should be that much nature anywhere and when had mountains ever been of use to anyone? But he was quieter after he thawed out and could sit still for up to an hour, staring into the fire and filling ash tray after ash tray. You caught him sometimes watching the locals and more often their drinks. If things got too merry for his liking, he sighed and slunk up to his room to do gods’ knew what for the rest of the night. Sofie said she’d heard things thumping against the walls.

The mystery living under your roof was too much for any of the workers to ignore and the gossip about him persisted. No one had much luck and it soon deteriorated into just commenting on the odd things he did, which wasn’t much to work with and quickly became repetitive.

It only took a few days until Stone begrudgingly submitted to your attempts at making small talk, sometimes going so far as to humour it with a few responses as long as you stuck to safe topics and kept out of his personal space, which seemed to extent almost two metres from his body. He always looked just vaguely in your direction and only straight at you when he forgot himself.

Winter was making the best of what little time it had left. On your next day off, the snow laid so thickly even on the roads that you decided to forgo your usual trip to the village and retreat instead to the upstairs parlour.

It didn’t really live up to the name - it was a cramped room with a dining table taking up most of the floor space and in the slow season it doubled as extra storage space. The one draw was the bookshelves that ran from floor to ceiling across two walls, housing a full encyclopaedia of some 20 volumes with impressive spines and a lot of books left behind by residents along with the third hand copies the landlady had been able to collect on the cheap. Stuck indoors, it was the best, or at least safest, way to while away an afternoon so you snuck in, pulled a chair up beside the window and sank into it, already engrossed in a well worn copy of Marjorie J. Boddice’s “Towers of Steel”.

The door swung open and you sat up straight in your seat with a start, trying to get a sense of how long you’d been in there. The cup of tea you’d brought along had stopped steaming. Stone stood there still holding the door handle, looking caught.

“Damn. Sorry, miss.” He moved to exit the room again but you got out of your seat and gestured to him.

“No, by all means. Did you want something?”

He took in the scene and a grin tugged at one corner of his mouth. “Skiving off work, are we?”

“It’s my day free.”

Stone looked bemusedly at the book, saying without words that he couldn’t picture someone reading if they had other options. “Right. Then never you mind what I want.”

Always so brusque. But, interestingly, not leaving.

“Maybe I’m just that happy to serve.”

That got you a snort and a Look. He seemed to be getting used to your double entendres already, which was a real shame. If he hadn’t been so uncomfortable and determined to pretend he didn’t catch them, you probably wouldn’t have kept them coming. Knowing he wouldn’t respond in turn made him the safest possible target.

“Yeah, I definitely get that impression,” said Stone sarcastically. He’d entered the room with the door still open and started snooping around the shelves, even lifting the lid of a box on the table to peek at the contents. “No, I was just looking for a pencil.”

“Oh, are you writing your memoirs?”

Another snort. “You lot are just bored out of your wits stuck here all winter, aren’t you? I swear, if one more person stops whispering mid sentence when I turn to look at them...”

“You seem pretty restless yourself.” He conceded this truth with a shrug but continued his investigation, unashamed. Perhaps he wouldn’t even mind a little bit of conversation today, so you pressed on. “Besides, a handsome, paranoid man covered in scars who wears suspiciously unassuming clothed, carries a sword and enough coin to pay for everything up front... how could we not speculate?”

The ‘handsome’ had made him start and look at you again to check if you were making fun of him. Now he smiled, helped himself to an apple from a crate and sat on the table to peel it with a pocket knife. “What’s the current theory, then?”

Gods bless the snow for keeping him inside - he’d already said more to you today than in all the other days combined. You took a swig of the cold tea and got comfortable in your seat again, watching him carefully. “Sofie thinks you’re a killer for hire laying low until the heat dies down.”

Stone shook his head. “Not very imaginative in my opinion.”

“I think I favour Mrs Erickson’s story better.”

“This would be the lady of the house, yes?”

“Yes. In her defence, Mr Erickson has never been what you’d call an ideal husband.”

“Oh dear.”

You leaned in conspiratorially, delighted to see how he tensed up in anticipation. “She thinks you’re the second son a highborn lord, embroiled in a torrid affair with your older brother’s beautiful trophy wife.”

“I bet,” Stone grumbled and popped a piece of the apple into his mouth.

“Now you’ve been discovered, in the chapel of all places, and run out of the castle in only your breeches.” To your delight, he’d begun to colour.

But he was brave and nodded sagely. “Hence the cheap clothes.”

“Exactly. You had agreed to elope together that very night, and so here you wait, in the first inn this side of the border, tormented, not knowing whether your brother’s soldiers or your beloved will find you first.”

“If I’d known that’s the kind of nonsense people would say about me, I think I would have set up camp in a cave somewhere.”

“And frozen to death.”

Stone shrugged as if that’d be a small price to pay.

You watched him still and he ignored this. “So?”

“So, what?”

“What’s the real story?”

“Oh, I’m just an old soldier who doesn’t know what to make of his retirement.”

Now it was your turn to snort. “Yes, you seem the type to follow orders. Come on, I want to know.”

“Well, miss.” Stone flashed you a pure piss-taking grin. “I could tell you...”

“...but then you’d have to kill me?”

“Clever.”

You leaned back with a sigh. “That would at least be interesting.”

Stone was quiet for a moment and carved up another slice of the fruit. “An interesting life’s not all it’s cracked up to be.” Then he seemed to catch himself. He cleared his throat, got off the table and swiped a pencil stub into his hand. “Got what I came for. Sorry again for bothering you, miss.”

“I don’t mind chatting to you, mr Stone. You know that.”

He shook his head at this and with another stern look at your left ear, he turned and closed the door behind him.

**Author's Note:**

> Discworld is my ONLY proper fandom and Vimes is as close as I'll ever come to loving a man, so I desperately want to write fic, this as well as many others. That being said, I've found out pretty recently that I have ADHD so while I'm incredibly motivated and grateful for any comments or kudos, I can never promise to finish anything. I intend to! But I can't promise I'll be able to. Thank you so much for reading!


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